IIA - Kavalur Black holes workshop 2026

Venue, Travel and accommodation details

The workshop will be held on the picturesque campus of the Vainu Bappu Observatory (VBO), a field station of the Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA). This campus is located near the village of Kavalur in the Javadi Hills in Tamil Nadu. Established in the 1970s, VBO hosts the 1m Carl Zeiss Telescope, the 1.3m J.C. Bhattacharya Telescope (JCBT) and the 2.3m Vainu Bappu Telescope (VBT).

Students who are selected for the Workshop will be provided free boarding/lodging at the Vainu Bappu Observatory at Kavalur. Accommodations for participants will be provided on a shared basis.

The nearest train stations are Vaniambadi and Jolarpettai, from where road transport to the Observatory will be arranged by IIA. Alternatively, the Observatory campus is about a three-and-a-half hour drive from the IIA-Bangalore campus, from where also, road transport to VBO will be arranged by IIA.

In the registration form the applicant must inform about their arrival station whether Vaniambadi or Jolarpettai or Bangalore. The arrival location mentioned in the form cannot be changed later due to logistic constraints.